Our orientation to “thinking” and “feeling” (T/F) Thinking/Feeling The Thinking/Feeling axis was developed when we first acquired speech and developing cognition around its neural architecture. In fact, the human story is the story of the development of our species left brain and its thinking role in self and group. If the Self/Group axis is the strongest in terms of affecting mainstream human behavior and our group organizations, then the Thinking/Feeling axis affects our personal behavior and daily existence more than any other. We can sense the Thinking/Feeling in our own consciousness. Every part of the consciousness we can identify is experienced as a feeling or a thought. Feelings come to us from the silent world of the vision-based right brain. Thoughts come to us from the speech-based left brain. Figure. The Thinking/Feeling axis was established when our species departed the animal world. Our consciousness is filled with Thinking and Feeling. Our daily living is experienced as thinking and feeling. Significant distinctions between individual humans exist along this axis. Our “silent” right brain has no words. However, it can very strongly exert its influence over our consciousness and our being. Our feelings and emotions come sometimes overwhelm us. Emotions such as anger, love, being hurt, revenge, sorrow, elation, etc. can be extremely powerful. It is also difficult putting words to these emotions. Poets have attempted to do so, but always fall short of being able to perfectly describe an emotion. Our Ego is our thinking self. For most people, the thinking ego dominates our consciousness. Our thinking ability is amazing. Look at all the thinking about things you are doing as you read this book. We can think about things far beyond the desires of our ego. We can think about our group responsibilities, what is right or wrong, and the meaning of life. We can even think about the feelings and emotions experienced by the right brain. Figure. Our right and left brains have developed higher-level cognitive skills based upon the senses of vision and speech respectively. These higher levels have added to the complexity of both thinking and feeling. People differ in their thinking/feeling weighting. Some people are much better in touch with their feelings, whereas others seem remote from their feelings and live instead in the “rational” thinking left brain. Those who are in touch with their feelings are considered “sensitive”; those who are always rational can be considered cerebral but insensitive and unfeeling. We can become “aware” of our feelings when our thinking left brain can verbalize or think about the fact that they are there. The feelings are word-less, but our thinking consciousness can “say” that they are there. We all have feelings, but some are more able to be aware of them than others. Sometimes we have a background feeling that is gnawing at us. We may not be aware of it, but it may eventually get the attention of our left brain and rise to “awareness”. There appears a wide range of human capacity for the left brain thinking to be aware of the right brain feelings and for it to motivate behavior. Some people are known to “wear their feelings on their sleeve”. Such individuals are known to be very emotional. Others keep their emotions under strong control, with the rational left brain suppressing their effects.
Posted on: Wed, 10 Jul 2013 11:12:31 +0000
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